Ethiopian Animation Sunday Morning Wins Two Awards at Durban FilmMart

Sunday Morning, an Ethiopian animation project, won two awards at the 17th Durban FilmMart in South Africa. Nahom Abiy produces the project and Minasie Terefe directs it. It took the Best Animation grant and the Animation Production Days Award, according to a media release from the Durban FilmMart.

The Durban FilmMart (DFM) ran from October 9 to 12 in the South African city of Durban. It brought together 1,131 film professionals and filmmakers from 56 countries, the release said. The awards were presented on its last day, Monday, October 12.

A Grant of 100,000 Rand

The National Film and Video Foundation of South Africa (NFVF) gave Sunday Morning its Best Animation grant of R100,000, or 100,000 South African rand. The foundation gave grants of the same size for fiction and non-fiction. Nigeria’s The Boy Who Spoke Static won the fiction grant, and Kenya’s The Ones With the Tempered Flowers won the non-fiction grant.

The organizers said the 39 awards from 30 partners were worth more than R2 million, which they put at more than 120,900 U.S. dollars. At that rate, the Sunday Morning grant is worth about 6,000 dollars.

The second prize gives the producer a place to stay for three nights and an industry badge for Animation Production Days 2027. Animation Production Days (APD) is a market in Stuttgart, Germany, where animation projects meet possible partners and funders, its website says. The next edition runs from April 27 to 29, 2027. Capital newspaper noted that the announcement did not mention flights.

Other winners from the region in the release include Kenya’s Heirs of No Regret. Sudan’s Where Do I Belong? won four awards.

A Series for Young Children

Sunday Morning is planned as a 3D (three-dimensional) animated series for preschool children, with six-minute episodes. That is what its project page says on the website of the Annecy International Animation Film Festival in France. It follows four children who try to turn a quiet Sunday into an adventure without waking their sleepy parent.

Minasie directs the project, and Behagerlij Studio in Addis Ababa produces it with Nahom, the Annecy page says. Nahom is a co-founder of the studio, Broadcast Media Africa reported in 2024.

“When we were children, Sunday was the only day we could really have fun,” Minasie told the Ethiopia Observer. “Unfortunately for us, it was also the very day our parents desperately needed to rest.”

Two Prizes in Annecy Earlier This Year

In June, the project went to the International Animation Film Market (MIFA), which is held with the Annecy festival. There it won the Best TV Series or Special prize of AGrAF, an association of animation writers in France, Capital reported. It also received the Disney Television Animation Award there, according to Ecofin Agency. Capital and the Ethiopia Observer said the project has been optioned, or reserved, for development as a possible Disney Channel and Disney+ series.

Minasie told Capital in August that no Ethiopian project had been officially selected to present, or pitch, at MIFA before. He said this was a first in the festival’s 66 years.

The Studio’s Earlier Films

Minasie trained as an architect before he chose animation, the Ethiopia Observer reported. He also directed the animated shorts Endegena and Zarem Arbegna, which Capital said have won several awards and were screened around the world.

Video: Endegena, an earlier animated short by Behagerlij Studio, published on the studio’s YouTube channel in March 2021. It is not a clip from Sunday Morning.

After the Durban awards, Behagerlij wrote a post on LinkedIn to thank its supporters. It named Habesha Creative Lab and the Alliance Ethio-Française in Addis Ababa, which it said had supported the project from the start. Capital noted that the awards announcement gave no production schedule or release date for Sunday Morning.